Beautifully illustrated with color photos on every page, this visual history of the ancient Western world turns to the ancients themselves to offer descriptions of their world. The lives and words of emperors, pharaohs, kings, and philosophers are recorded here, as well as accounts from restaurant owners, doctors, farmers, gladiators, and soldiers. Among the illustrations are inscriptions from every major civilization of the era, from the 3rd millennium BC Sargon legend to Roman inscriptions from the 4th century AD, with translations from such sources as the Code of Hammurabi, Ptolemy V's Rosetta Stone, and the Greek Parian Marble.